Construction on San Pedro Avenue near Summit is part of a flood-control project in the Alta Vista and Monte Vista areas. The project targets a hilly, 104-acre residential area that drains into the San Antonio River north of downtown.

Photo: Helen L. Montoya, SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS

Construction on San Pedro Avenue near Summit is part of a...

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Construction is slated to begin on Kings Highway as part of a massive flood-control project under way in Alta Vista/Monte Vista.

Photo: Helen L. Montoya, San Antonio Express-News

Construction is slated to begin on Kings Highway as part of a...

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Construction on San Pedro Ave is part of a massive flood-control project under way in Alta Vista/Monte Vista.

The goal was to engineer an end to chronic flooding on San Pedro Avenue near Mark Twain Middle School, and after two years of tumultuous construction in the Alta Vista neighborhood, much of the objective is accomplished — except for drainage upgrades uphill in historic Monte Vista.

Even before digging could begin in Monte Vista, its influential residents forced a downsizing of the drainage project, resulting in new plans that will prolong lane closures on busy San Pedro.

The redesign is less intrusive and less costly, but Monte Vista residents still question the need for the planned work. Even so, they've agreed to a new approach that affects two blocks of San Pedro and one block of West Kings Highway, between San Pedro and Belknap.

Bids must be sought for the revised designs, and some recently installed storm sewers under San Pedro must be replaced with larger systems, officials acknowledged. Yet at $1.9 million, the work in Monte Vista will cost $2.1 million less than the original design, Precinct 2 Commissioner Paul Elizondo said.

“There was a lot of resistance about going into Monte Vista,” Elizondo said, but the county was determined to alleviate notorious flooding near Mark Twain, he said.

“Since water flows downhill, you've got to repair east and north of Mark Twain,” Elizondo said.

The three-phase “San Pedro-Huisache” project is part of the county's 10-year, $500 million flood-control initiative. It targets a hilly, 104-acre residential area that drains into the San Antonio River north of downtown. Phase 1 was a city project near the Five Points area; Phase 2 in Alta Vista was substantially completed in November; and Phase 3 is the Monte Vista aspect.

More storm runoff must be captured in Monte Vista for installations downhill to perform as designed, said county engineer Renee Green. Revised plans still accomplish that, she said.

Design changes were negotiated after the Monte Vista association's board voted in July against curb inlet drains, which were installed in Alta Vista.

“When we started this project back in 2009, the historical association was very adamant about the type of storm drains we could use. They only wanted us to use curb inlets and not street grates,” Green said.

“Once the community saw how, in their eyes, invasive the curb inlets were ... guess what came back up? Street grates,” she said.

The county has collaborated with the city, which will maintain the new drains. Bids will be sought in May, and construction could start in September. The work should take about eight months, Green said.

He defended Monte Vista's stance against a larger system, saying, “It was going to be a really big, disruptive project. There were a lot of complaints about the scope,” he said.

The scaled-down plan “is going to save the taxpayers many millions of dollars,” Caldwell said.

“The main problem is, that means San Pedro is going to stay torn up for nine more months,” he said, and there are concerns about upkeep of street grates to be installed on West Kings Highway.

Work on San Pedro, which is reduced from four to two lanes, has been taxing for Monte Vista homeowners as well as those in Alta Vista, Caldwell said.

“We have people living along San Pedro that haven't been able to park in their driveways for a year. They have huge machines parked, sitting idle, for weeks at a time, in front of their houses. There's just a lot of inactive stretches on this project.”

Alta Vista residents make similar observations. Maricel Stephen, who's endured two years of upheaval around her home, said “the neighborhood has been really patient with this whole ordeal ... but things didn't go the way they said.”

After new drains were installed, streets were paved and curbs were added, but numerous complaints about unfinished work and property damage are pending, she said. Resolving them “doesn't look real promising,” Stephen said.

Beyond damage to trees and lawns, she said, “it was just a disaster, with dust and everything else. You can't imagine the mud. The trash, the mailman — people just couldn't get through.”

“They did this patchwork of sidewalks and street work. They tore up the neighborhood. They set us back — our revitalization,” Stephen contends.

Precinct 4 Commissioner Tommy Adkisson, who represented the project area until redistricting put it in Elizondo's district last year, is convinced the residents' hardships will pay off.

“It's the first time in nearly 100 years that the drainage has been dealt with, so I'm happy to see that it's being addressed, but every one of these projects involves massive inconvenience and hassles,” Adkisson said.